


Like Mother Like Son

by Gaffsie



Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Ancient Technology, Established Relationship, Genderswap, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-12
Updated: 2012-05-12
Packaged: 2017-11-05 05:25:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/402904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gaffsie/pseuds/Gaffsie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cam has a little accident with ancient tech.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Mother Like Son

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the promt "Genderflip: always been male/female and turned into a woman/man."

"This is the last time I let you talk me into coming here," Cam moaned.

He was standing in front of the bathroom mirror in John's quarters, John anxiously peering over his shoulder. Cam had already known the extent of the damage when Doc Keller had finally released him from the infirmary, but seeing it all laid out in front of him like this was different than catching glimpses of his body and seeing it reflected on everyone's faces. He had been able to distance himself from it then, but looking at his body like this, seeing every new curve and softened angle, he couldn't deny what had been done to him, what he'd stupidly (so stupid, and all because he'd wanted to mend fences with McKay for John's sake) allowed to be done to him.

Looking back at him from the mirror was a woman, and Cam didn't know what to do with that.

John gave him a wounded look, his eyebrows drawn together in that way that usually made Cam smile. It was with grim satisfaction he noted that this time, it didn't work.

"How is this my fault?!" John asked. "I wasn't the one who agreed to let McKay use a strange piece of Ancient tech on me!" He sounded angry, which was good. Cam was angry too.

"He told me it was safe!" Cam shouted, his glare meeting John's equally stormy expression in the mirror. The worst part was that McKay had clearly believed it - in the infirmary he'd been wringing his hands, eyes darting every which way to avoid looking at Cam as he explained what had happened.

_"It should have been safe!" McKay had pleaded with him. "We'd made sure that the equipment in the room was disconnected from the city power grid and checked with the linguistic department that our translations of the database were correct. Even if some idiot had turned the power back on without telling me, that piece of machinery shouldn't have been able to do anything more intrusive than performing a deep pore clean on you!"_

_McKay's face didn't hide anything. He was guilty, afraid, and, more than anything else, confused. "If I'd wanted to wanted to initiate anything in there I would have made Lorne come with me. You were just supposed to act as a military escort."_

_Cam had almost felt sorry for McKay, which was crazy, because he wasn't the one currently sporting what looked like a very respectable B-cup._

_"Don't worry, Mitchell," McKay had said before scurrying away back to what they'd foolishly thought was an Ancient spa, "Zelenka and I are working on it. "We'll figure this out."_

John, who'd apparently gained mind-reading powers when Cam wasn't looking, said, "don't worry. McKay and Zelenka are on it. They'll have you back to normal in no-time."

Cam smirked joylessly. "Care to make it a bet?"

John's eyes softened. "Hey," he said, and put his arms around Cam's new, slighter frame. "I promise. They'll figure this out."

Cam leaned back against John's chest and let John wrap his arms around him. It in no way made up for losing his dick, but it was nice that he could let John take his weight like this when normally he was too tall for that to be anything but awkward.

"How can you be so sure?"

John snorted. "I turned into a bug once, remember? At least you're still the same species you started out as."

"At least you didn't look like your _mother_ ," Cam muttered.

"There are worse things to look like," John said, and, privately, Cam had to agree. He hadn't been there for John's transformation and eventual recovery, but he'd read the reports. It hadn't been pretty.

"And my mind is still my own," he said, finally turning around in John's arms to hug him like he wanted to.

John was a weird hugger, never really knowing where to put his hands, but that was comforting in its own way - there really was no mistaking John's hugs.

"We should sleep," John mumbled against Cam's hair. "Let the geniuses work the night through -"

"In a minute," Cam said, and held on.

~*~

It turned out the geniuses really had been burning the midnight oil, because when Woolsey called to a meeting with Doctors Keller, McKay and Zelenka; Woolsey, Cam and John were the only people at the conference table without dark circles under their eyes.

Cam wished he could read them better; he had no idea of the jitteriness they were all displaying was due to too much caffeine and sugar, or nerves.

"Well," Woolsey said, prim as ever, and once again Cam found himself wondering why John was so fond of the man. Once a finicky bureaucrat, always a finicky bureaucrat. But then again, John was friends with _McKay_.

"I believe that Dr McKay has some news."

"Yes," McKay said. "I did some digging" - Zelenka coughed. McKay rolled his eyes. "As I was saying, _we_ did some digging."

"And?" Cam demanded. He did not have the time for any scientist pissing contests right now.

"That room really had been disconnected from the grid, and the machine in question really was labelled 'pore cleanser'."

"That's real helpful, McKay," Cam said.

McKay glared at him. "This would go faster without the constant interruptions from the peanut gallery. Now, without actually dismantling the machinery" -

"No," John said, to Cam's relief.

With a scowl directed at John, McKay continued. "Yes, well, thanks to the encrypted information I managed to extract from the database, we now know that the machine had been deliberately mislabelled and that it was drawing power from its own internal power source."

Woolsey leaned forward in his seat, something predatory lurking in his eyes. "Dr Mckay, are you saying that an expedition member sabotaged the database?"

"Please," McKay said, "the only expedition member with the skills and intelligence necessary to do that is me, and I have no interest in turning Mitchell into a woman. I prefer not to have members of the military after my blood."

He twisted his lips, like he'd bitten into a particularly sour piece of lemon."No, what I'm saying is that an Ancient - probably the person responsible for the machine's construction - went to great lengths to hide its existence.

Dr Keller coughed theatrically. "And on that bombshell," she quipped, and fell silent.

Say what you will about Woolsey, Cam thought, but he rallied quickly. "Yes, Dr Keller."

"Yeah," Keller said, sounding a little embarrassed. "From what I can tell, whoever built that device intended for it to work exactly as it did on Colonel Mitchell. As for why it was done in secret, who knows. Maybe the Ancients weren't big on making any changes to the body that didn't lead to Ascension."

"So it's a sex change machine," John said.

"It's actually a little more complicated than that," Keller said, and Cam's heart sunk. "This machine didn't simply turn Colonel Mitchell into a woman; it effectively gave him the body he would have had if he'd been _born_ a woman.

"Breaking several natural laws in the process," Zelenka muttered.

Keller glared at him. "Do you have something against gender reassignment surgery, doctor?" She asked acidly.

Zelenka looked up from his laptop, peering over the rim of his glasses like a startled owl. "Huh? No, no. I'm thinking of mass."

At Keller's blank look, he continued. "There is less of Colonel Mitchell today than there was yesterday, yes? Where did it go?"

McKay snapped his fingers excitedly. "An alternative reality!"

"That's ridiculous, Rodney," Zelenka said. "Are you suggesting that the Colonel switched body with a female version of himself who had the exact same scars and marks on her body as him?"

He glanced over at Cam. "And who had the same haircut?"

"That only proves I'm right," McKay said."Why else didn't he get longer hair?"

"Rodney," Keller said. "Are you seriously suggesting that hair length is genetically predisposed?"

McKay visibly deflated. "Oh, right. Well. It could still be an alternative reality drive!"

"Never mind that," Cam said, hating the pleading tone his voice had taken. "Can you undo it?"

Zelenka and McKay looked at each other.

" _I_ think so," Keller said."As far as your DNA goes, you've always been a woman. If the machine's still functional, I don't see why it wouldn't work."

"Is the machine still working?" Mr Woolsey asked.

"Yes," McKay said. "We're running diagnostics on it right now, but everything looks good so far."

He smirked at Cam, clearly confident that he was no longer in any danger of being murdered in a fit of rage (not that he'd ever been, but Cam wasn't going to tell him that). "Don't worry, Colonel, you'll have your little Colonel back by tomorrow."

"McKay," John growled, obviously not amused.

"That is good news." Woolsey beamed at him. "Keep me posted. Meeting adjourned."

Everyone started to collect their laptops and cups of coffee and file out of the meeting room, but Cam was too relieved to get up just yet. He just needed a moment to collect himself. John seemed to sense it and stayed behind too.

They just sat in silence for a while, Cam thinking and John watching him, but finally John got up from his chair and walked around the table to where Cam was seated.

He slapped Cam on the shoulder. "I told you it would be fine."

"You did," Cam said. "Sorry for doubting your people."

John squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. "You were entitled to." With one last shoulder slap, he made for the door. "Now c'mon. What do you want to do on your last day as a woman?"

THE END


End file.
